Sports Direct responsible for 20% of every zero hour contract in retail

We all know that Sports Direct is run like a 'backstreet operation', thanks to a dressing down offered to the company. Well, in news that will surprise precisely no-one, there's more.

Sports Direct is responsible for a fifth of all zero hour contracts in retail.

After a number of revelations about the company, chairman Keith Hellawell said that they used zero hour contracts no more than any other retailer, however, the figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) suggest something rather different.

Hellawell said: "I suspect that, in percentage terms, we are probably not much different from other people in the retail business. It is just that we are so big, so the numbers are quite substantial." ONS stats show that from October to December 2014, just 1.8% of people working in retail and wholesale were on zero-hour contracts. If this is right, then around 72,000 have jobs on these controversial contracts, with one in five of them working for Sports Direct.

With Sports Direct only giving staff at USC (who they own) 15 minutes notice of the business going into administration, it turns out that everyone sacked might be able to take Sports Direct to a tribunal.

Mike Ashley, if he's got any sense, will be smelling the warm pants of trouble. He'd be wise to act, sharply.